It is once again nearing exam season and I’m always on the look out for exciting things to make for dinner/dessert to get me through the piles of revision I’m attempting to sift through. This recipe was inspired by my apple corer. For some reason it was in the cupboard rather than in the cutlery draw and I picked it up whilst making dinner….and that’s when this funky dessert idea was born.

Do you love apples? And pancakes? This could just be what you’re looking for to brighten up your evening. This super-simple pancake recipe can be made in less than 5 minutes and is absolutely delicious!

Ingredients:

1 apple, cored and sliced horizontally

1 egg

1 scoop protein powder

2 tbsp coconut flour

1 tsp chia seeds

1 tbsp milk

1 tbsp coconut oil

Toppings (I used Manuka Honey)

Method:

Beat the egg in a bowl and add in the protein powder, coconut flour and chia seeds. Add the milk until you get a thick consistency.

Heat a medium sized frying pan and add the coconut oil.

Dip the apple slices in the pancake mix and place in the flying pan to cook for around 90 seconds on each side, depending on what heat you’ve got the pan on.

Brace yourself**. Last weekend I tried Eggs Florentine for the first time [insert shocked emoji here*]. I’m very much a creature of habit and when choosing brunch I naturally always go for toast with poached eggs and either avocado or fried mushrooms.

I was visiting Sheffield for the first time and Hannah, a lady very educated in lovely local coffee shops and brunch spots, suggested we ate at Made By Jonty for lunch. This quaint little café had the perfect all-day brunch menu, and if that didn’t tempt you, there was an array of delicious cakes and bakes on display by the counter. The café was able to serve any of the brunch items on gluten free toast if you made the waiters aware that you were a Coeliac. To this day I’m not sure what made me go for Eggs Florentine…after all avocado was on the menu…but anyhow, it changed me.

The poached eggs were perfect. The hollandaise sauce was en pointe. Even the presentation was immaculate. It was demolished in a matter of minutes. How have I lived for nearly 20 years and never had this…it continues to amaze me.

Anyhow now having only ever had hollandaise sauce once, and that having been made for me, I wanted to try and make some at home in an attempt to recreate this dish. This recipe for Eggs Florentine is made using a ‘light’ hollandaise sauce and tastes divine.

Ingredients:

2 slices of bread, toasted

spinach, to serve

2 eggs and 2 yolks

1 tbsp butter, melted

1/2 cup greek yoghurt

1 tbsp lemon juice

1 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tsp mustard

sprinkle of salt

Method:

Start by placing the 2 yolks, greek yoghurt, melted butter, lemon juice, cayenne pepper, mustard and salt in a dish and stir until well combined.

Place over a bain-marie and stir every now and then as it starts to thicken for 10 or so minutes until it is of the desired consistency.

Whilst the hollandaise sauce is heating, poach two eggs in boiling water and toast the bread.

Layer spinach onto the toast and place the poached eggs on top. Add the hollandaise sauce to the top and enjoy hot!

It’s that time of year when people realise their frying pans are far too heavy, their flipping skills are poor and Nutella is actually very sickly. If you’re anything like me with absolutely no pancake flipping skills what-so-ever then you might appreciate this recipe for some thicker American-style pancakes.

These completely gluten free pancakes have the texture of a fluffy Victoria Sponge cake. The coconut sugar adds a subtle sweet flavour but if you’re making savoury ones, you can leave this out.

Ingredients:

1 egg, whisked

1 banana, mashed

1 tbsp gluten free oats, ground (I used Deliciously Alchemy)

1 tbsp coconut sugar (I used The Groovy Food Company)

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tbsp coconut oil (I used Lucy Bee)

Dash of milk

Method:

Whisk the egg in bowl and combine with the mashed banana.

Mix the oats, coconut sugar and baking powder in a bowl and add to the wet mixture. Stir until well combined (you could also place in a blender to make sure you remove all the lumps!). If the mix is too thick, add some milk until it is of the desired consistency.

Place a frying pan on the hob over a medium heat and wait for the coconut oil to melt.

Pour about 1/4 of the mix slowly into the centre and cook for 1-2 minutes before flipping over (carefully!). Repeat until all the mix is used.

The Edgbaston Hotel is a luxury Boutique Hotel and Cocktail Lounge in the outskirts of Birmingham. Alongside the usual impressive hotel facilities, there was a beautiful tea room which can be booked for special occasions and private parties.

To celebrate Charlotte’s 20th Birthday we headed here as a group of 8 for an evening of afternoon tea; leaving utterly impressed is an understatement. With a large white and welcoming entrance, from the moment we set foot on the driveway we knew it was going to be something special. It was fairly busy when we arrived but we were lead in by the waiter and sat along the far wall. Although we were in a corner we were still able to capture the relaxed atmosphere.

As you can see, the tables were laid out beautifully. We were handed the menus which gave us the option of either a standard or luxury afternoon tea, but also included a huge range of both hot and iced speciality teas. With drink refills free when accompanying the afternoon tea we were able to sample quite a few. Around half of us chose to start with normal tea whilst the others decided upon one of the beautifully presented iced teas.

To start the food, we were presented with chocolate mousses topped with a lime and lavender sorbet. These were brought to us with dry ice which was pretty amazing! That was the first time I’d seen dry ice used in a restaurant and it was a lovely way to start the experience.

Following this, we were each brought our own selection of filled sandwiches, toasts with overflowing toppings and delicately designed desserts. With another Coeliac in the group as well as myself I was confident that they’d provide a good gluten free equivalent to the normal menu – even laid out on a slate it looked exceptional. Not only was the presentation perfect, the rolls weren’t dry and you could just tell that so much delicacy had been put into creating each little dessert.

The desserts selection included an almond macaron, a rhubarb cream pudding and a rum, coconut and chocolate truffle – the macaron has to have been my favourite; with a thin layer of cream in the centre it just tasted divine! To finish, we were given some AMAZING scones. These are probably my highlight of the afternoon tea – usually gluten free scones are small, dry and a little dull, these however were flavoursome, moist and, when filled with oodles of cream and jam, tasted out of this world (I wasn’t the only one that thought this)!!

For £25 a head we were truly satisfied – if this hotel had been in London I think it would have cost us a lot more! The waitresses were very efficient, caring and we had such a lovely evening.

Macro/calorie tracking, I’m sure many of you are familiar with the drill. You track all the food/drinks you consume to the gram and use an app or website such as myfitnesspal to add it all up for you. The more premium sites will break down the macronutrients into carbs, fats and proteins and allow you to set personal daily targets. Tracking macros is commonly used by bikini fitness competitors, weight lifters and can be used as a weight loss tool.

After seeing various fitness/insta friends track their macros (all for very valid reasons) I decided to do it for a few days and see what it was like. The reason I don’t track macros is that I don’t feel I need/want to restrict my diet that much – I’m not actively trying to lose/gain weight and I try to maintain a balance with my life, spontaneously eating what I want when I want. I believe that eating should be a pleasure, not a chore or hassle.

Here are my thoughts having tracked for 3 days:

Tracking macros takes a lot of time and effort. Weighing things out into exact portions and entering them into the app isn’t a quick task….especially when you’re used to just chucking dinner in a pan and getting on with it.

Staying under your daily sugar target is tough. Most foods with some form of carbohydrate in them contain sugar, but macro tracking makes you realise just how much. Fruit, drinks and even snack bars have surprisingly large amounts in!

Reaching your protein goal is very hard!! When you consider that my protein target is roughly 125g and there is 6g in an egg….you see the problem.

Snack bars are very high in sugar – even the ‘healthy’ ones.

You start to obsess over measuring even the tiniest of things, like 10ml of milk for tea. Normally I just pour milk in my tea without faffing – this made making a simple cup of tea into a 5 minute task.

Reaching your RDA for vitamin A and C is so easy. I snack on carrots a lot and carrots contain high levels of both these vitamins.

Personally, although I found it interesting to see the macro break down of the food, I feel it would be unecessary to do it long term – I very much prefer to be spontaneous with food and not have to worry about whether I’ve gone over or not hit my target. Most of the exercise I do is cardio based and therefore it is also far less significant to track macros.

For more info on tracking macros, check out some articles from Ben Coomber. If you decide to track macros, t’s always best to seek professional advice to help you work out what your personal ones would be otherwise you could get them incredibly wrong!!!

I'm Beth, a Runner, Coeliac and Freelance Blogger. If I'm not out pounding the pavements in neon lycra I'm either eating peanut butter out of the jar in my PJs or wishing I could be doing one (or both) of the two. 🥑